Because of this, women perform better as corporate leaders

Mar 26, 2013 14:57 GMT  ·  By

Two specialists recently went through the trouble of trying to figure out whether the best decisions are more often than not taken by men or by women.

Following their investigations, they came to understand that the latter are significantly more gifted when it comes to both weighing pro and con arguments, and balancing competing ones. Because of this, women are now argued to be better decision makers than most men are.

These conclusions were reached after Chris Bart, a professor at the DeGroote School of Business at McMaster University, and Gregory McQueen, a senior executive associate dean at A.T. Still University's School of Osteopathic Medicine, Arizona interviewed a total of 600 board directors, both men and women.

Despite the fact that the women who agreed to take part in this research only made up about 25% of the total number of board directors interviewed by the researchers, it was discovered that their leadership skills were more efficient in terms of getting the job done.

According to EurekAlert, women employed as corporate leaders are ready and willing to cause a stir whenever it is necessary, just to make sure that the results are the desired one.

As well as this, they are more likely to take into consideration the opinions of others when deciding on a course of actions, and not settle for trying to get things done their way without paying any attention to morality or to how fair their decisions are.

“Women seem to be predisposed to be more inquisitive and to see more possible solutions. At the board level where directors are compelled to act in the best interest of the corporation while taking the viewpoints of multiple stakeholders into account, this quality makes them more effective corporate directors,” Gregory McQueen commented with respect to these findings.

On the other hand, it appears that most men rely heavily on enforcing rules and regulations, and on promoting a more traditional approach to do business.

“We've known for some time that companies that have more women on their boards have better results. Our findings show that having women on the board is no longer just the right thing but also the smart thing to do. Companies with few female directors may actually be shortchanging their investors,” Chris Bart argued.

The findings of this research were published in the International Journal of Business Governance and Ethics.